


Building Jumpers: A Love Story (ABANDONED)

by VincentMeoblinn



Series: Finish Me [26]
Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms, Wristcutters: A Love Story (2006)
Genre: Eventual Romance, Gore, M/M, No Sex, Sad, Suicide, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-11-17
Updated: 2014-11-17
Packaged: 2018-02-26 13:59:43
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,396
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2654585
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VincentMeoblinn/pseuds/VincentMeoblinn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock really did die when he threw himself off of St. Bart’s Hospital, but he didn’t mean to. So when he finds himself trapped in Limbo he determines to find whoever is in charge of the miserable place and get himself sent to the place he’s really supposed to be. Slightly based on the movie “Wristcutters: A Love Story (2006).</p>
            </blockquote>





	Building Jumpers: A Love Story (ABANDONED)

“It’s not a punishment for me,” Eric Patel shrugged, “I mean, this isn’t the best life in the world but there’s nothing you can really do about it.”

“You aren’t being tortured by the image of your loved ones?” Josh Rivers asked, “Forced to watch them mourn for you for all eternity while you try hopelessly to reach them, forever wailing uselessly against the forces of natural order?”

Sherlock snorted. Josh was a failed poet who had hung himself after he finally realized he would never make it big… at the tender age of seventeen. He was quick to wax on about how he didn’t deserve to be punished for succumbing to depression. Sherlock agreed, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t sick and tired of the man whinging about it. Eric on the other hand was a mechanic who lost his shop in a bet and dropped the last car he ever repaired on himself intentionally in order to go out with a bang.

“Not tortured, no. I  _get to see them_ ,” Eric insisted happily, “I know they are well, and that comforts me.”

“Lucky Hindu bastard,” Josh groused.

Sherlock chuckled and so did Eric, though for different reasons. Eric went on to explain to Sherlock why Josh was saying that.

“My parents believe very strongly in reincarnation, and that it also happens to those who kill themselves. My mother spends the day talking to house bugs in the hopes that one of them is me.”

“Yesterday,” Josh continued bitterly, “My mother drank herself into a stupor, beat my little sister, and cried herself to sleep on the bathroom floor while screaming my name.  _His_ mother told a fly that she loves him very much and hopes he finds a nice girl fly to make maggots with before she grows old. So how did you kill yourself, tall dark and grouchy?”

“I didn’t commit suicide,” Sherlock groused, “I jumped off of a building and died.”

Josh and Eric both blinked at him for a moment, then gave each other worried looks. Finally it was Josh that spoke.

“Yeah, I can see how that’s different. Last minute regrets are the worst. Especially when you have to spend  _forever_  dealing with the results.”

“What evidence do you have that this horrible state lasts forever?” Sherlock asked, not bothering to explain the details to them.

They wordlessly pointed to a man sitting in the corner sobbing into his liquor. He was a Roman soldier in proper original garb with a gash across his throat that made his head wobble from side to side as he sobbed. It also leaked liquor a lot. Not blood. There was visible blood around and in the wound, but none of them bled. That was because this horrible place where colour was faded and no one smiled was Limbo- or whatever passed for it. They were trapped here forever- or for longer than a man who had invaded England before it had heard of the monarchy.

“Okay, point taken,” Sherlock sighed, “So what do we do?”

“You can go back to your home. There might be someone else living there, but you just kinda share space. It’s weird. You’ll get it when you see it for yourself.”

Sherlock already  _had_  seen it. He’d jumped from the roof of St. Bart’s and ended up falling to his death when the device meant to save him failed. He’d stood up and looked around himself in confusion while a strangely transparent John wept and moaned in agony over his body. He’d followed the hospital staff and John through the halls of St. Bart’s, watched him stoically identify Sherlock’s body, seen him go home and stand there with blood on his knees and a lost look in his eyes. He could relate to Josh’s feelings of this being their ‘punishment’ for killing themselves. Except he  _hadn’t_  killed himself, and now that his investigation into the afterlife was showing him that only those who killed themselves ended up here – no murderers or rapists- he was convinced there was some way to correct this oversight.

Being a scientist he’d not assumed as many ‘ghosts’ did that he was confined to his death site and/or home. So once he’d made peace with the fact he couldn’t comfort John he’d walked right out the door. Things varied in their world. Things they interacted with looked solid, but John and anything he touched was opaque and ghostly, often leaving trails in the vision while the solid version of the item he’d picked up remained in place for Sherlock to touch. Likewise the former inhabitants of Baker Street appeared only when he was close to them, usually giving him just as startled a look as he gave them. He imagined it was a surprise to them that their home now had  _more_  dead people walking through it. So far Sherlock had passed three other people who had killed themselves in or around 221 Baker Street and frequented his home. It was eerie to know that they had been able to see glimpses of him this entire time!

Sherlock could walk down the streets of London the same as he always did, but ethereal beings passed through and around him. That was what led him into this pub and the occupants therein that had appeared as solid. The bar tender served them drinks, a rope burn around his neck, for no charge; the same with the food. It didn’t matter what you ordered, it all tasted like chalk and fetid water. Sherlock had gagged on his first sip, asked if it was possible to even  _get_  drunk, received a positive reply, and decided he wasn’t  _quite_  that upset yet.

Then his conversation with Eric and Josh was interrupted by someone Sherlock had been waiting for waltzing into the pub.

“John,” Sherlock sighed.

“Someone you knew?” Josh asked.

“We can’t see him,” Eric explained, “Not unless he’s close by and only when he’s moving quickly. Most people are just breaths of wind unless you knew them.”

“I’ve noticed,” Sherlock nodded.

John approached close enough and the reason Sherlock had joined them at this table was revealed. It was John’s table. He sat down across from Sherlock and stared miserably at the room at large. Sherlock folded his hands and stared at him. Or rather he stared at  _Eric_ , who he then gave an annoyed glance and shooed away. Eric huffed and moved to stand beside their table, wobbling drunkenly, and Sherlock stared at his ghostly friend once again.

“Is there any way to get them to hear us?” Sherlock asked.

“Nope,” Josh replied, “We’re ghosts to them, and they’re ghosts to us. The visual and audio only goes one way.”

“So now that I know ghosts are real, it stands to reason other things are as well.”

“Angels and demons sort of guy, eh?” Eric smiled sadly, “There are rumours but I’ve never met anyone who has actually  _met_  the PIC.”

“PIC?” Sherlock asked, eyes riveting to Eric.

“People In Charge,” Josh replied with a shrug, “They’re supposedly who sent us here, but I just woke up here.”

“Me too,” Eric nodded, “I don’t think they exist.

Sherlock nodded and continued staring as John drank himself into oblivion. When John stood on wobbly legs to leave Sherlock found that Eric and Josh had left quite some time ago. The bar was practically empty. As Sherlock followed John out he caught some movement in his peripheries of other clientele, but as far as he was concerned only John existed and this world saw to that. They wandered back to Baker Street, Sherlock unconsciously reaching out to steady him many times but causing no actual reaction. John staggered inside, puked in the kitchen sink, and then stumbled upstairs to bed without washing his mouth out. He sobbed himself to sleep while Sherlock wrung his fingers in misery. That was when he began to wonder if he  _could_  sleep. Could he eliminate as well? He hadn’t eaten or drank anything, but he felt hungry so it stood to reason he should. No money was charged, but he’d seen more than one ghost going around in the occupation of his or her previous life. Habit? A way to stay sane?

 

_I won’t be able to prevent or solve crimes here. I’ll go mad!_

And then it hit him.

 _Moriarty_.


End file.
